More than 1,000 protesters burned a British flag Tue and the regional administration in Iraq's main southern province severed all ties with British authorities over video footage showing British soldiers allegedly beating and kicking Iraqi youths. In London, the British Defense Ministry announced the arrest of 2 more people in connection with the images. Another person apparently the man who shot the video was arrested Monday. Protesters, many of them supporters of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, marched on the British Consulate in Basra, where they burned the flag and shouted slogans against the alleged abuse of the youths during a riot Jan. 10, 2004, in the southern city of Amarah. Protesters held banners reading "No, no to Tony Blair" and "Try the British soldiers involved in this aggression." With outrage over the video mounting, the governing council for Basra province, which includes Iraq's huge southern oil fields, announced it was cutting all ties with British military ... http://www.usatoday.com

The former head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Policy helped write a memorandum of law calling for dismissal of Espionage Act charges against two pro-Israel lobbyists, arguing that, in receiving leaked classified information and relaying it to others, they were doing what reporters, think-tank experts and congressional staffers "do perhaps hundreds of times every day." Viet D. Dinh, who helped draft the USA Patriot Act after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, has joined with lawyers defending Steven J. Rosen and Keith Weissman, former employees of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), who last year became the first non-U.S. government employees to be indicted for allegedly violating provisions of the Espionage Act."Never has a lobbyist, reporter, or any other non-government employee been charged . . . for receiving oral information the government alleges to be national defense material as part of that person's normal First Amendment protected activities," ...http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/13/AR2006021301905_pf.html

Managers at one motel in Baton Rouge are trying to evict evacuees staying in 30 rooms, even though the Federal Emergency Management Agency is still paying for their stay.The owners of Pines Motel said the evacuees have trashed the rooms of their motel, and they need to leave.Managers Brent and Dana Servario went to door-to-door on Tuesday to tell evacuees the time had come for them to leave. Many of the evacuees have FEMA codes allowing them to stay until March 1, but managers called FEMA and were told if the evacuees are damaging the rooms they had a right to evict them.Despite the order from management, a majority of evacuees are not leaving the Pines Motel....http://www.2theadvocate.com/news/2311291.html

At the 2006 Conservative Political Action Conference last week in Washington, D.C., one question lingered:Which Republican will follow President Bush?For the first time in over a decade, the party has no favorite-son contender for the White House. Vice President Dick Cheney has said he doesn't want a shot at the top job.That leaves the field wide open. Several Republicans are already politicking for the nod by touring primary states and attending grass-roots events such as CPAC.Early rumblings suggest a conservative groundswell, but a shift to the center still has significant support.CPAC's presidential straw poll had Sen. George Allen, R-Va., as the favorite. He was cited as the likely nominee by 22% of the conservative activists, political donors and other GOP supporters at the conference....http://www.investors.com/editorial/IBDArticles.asp?artsec=16&issue=20060214

Authorities have cleared Vice President Dick Cheney of wrongdoing in the Texas shooting of a hunting companion, while reporters aimed tough questions at White House officials about their delay in disclosing the accident.Cheney arrived for work at the White House on Tuesday without comment and his spokeswoman said the vice president had no plans for any public statement about his shooting of Harry Whittington.Cheney is monitoring Whittington's condition through friends, spokeswoman Lea Anne McBride said, and he "is pleased" that Whittington "is doing well." Cheney and the 78-year-old Bush-Cheney campaign contributor were hunting quail on a friend's south Texas ranch Saturday when the accident took place.The state Parks and Wildlife Department issued Cheney a warning for not possessing a required stamp on his hunting license,...http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/02/14/cheney/index.html?section=cnn_us

A priest in Germany got more than he bargained for during confession when a man not only declared his sins, but also handed over a machine gun and a hand grenade, police in Bavaria said on Tuesday.“He also gave the priest a cardboard box with a clown’s face and the words ’Red Nose Day March 26, 2004’ on it containing 34 cartridges of 7.65 mm caliber,” police said in a statement.The priest from the southern town of Pfarrkirchen turned in the weapons to police but told them church rules governing confession prevented him from revealing the man’s identity....http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11345209/from/RSS/